SAN ANTONIO – Maria Benavidez says it’s a scary statistic: 7,000 kids quit school every day in the United States. And she said San Antonio is no stranger to this issue.
That’s why SA Youth was created.
“We provide a safe space for kids to come and get a quality education,” Benavidez, the president and CEO of SA Youth, said.
SA Youth is an organization that gives educational opportunities to San Antonio’s young people. Now in 2024, this team is celebrating 40 years of service.
“It’s exciting,” Benavidez said. “It’s exciting to think, knowing the challenges that we have faced with funding, building changes and the need for more space, it’s exciting to see where we’re going.”
SA Youth started in 1984 as an afterschool care program.
Now, four decades later, that program still stands and Benavidez said the team has added student cohorts for diploma recovery and workforce development to fill the other community gaps.
“Many of the students come to us with a lot of trauma in their lives that has kind of stopped their brain from allowing them to make connections that need to be made,” Benavidez said.
Some of the biggest misconceptions with these students are that they’re lazy and unmotivated, she said.
“It’s not true at all,” Benavidez said.
Right now, cohorts run on a 4-month cycle, targeting 16 to 24 year olds. Benavidez said each cohort is filled with about 30 students, but she said the waitlists are often in the triple digits.
“It’s a safe space for them,” Benavidez said. “Once they’re safe and they’re fed, then we can start talking to them about algebra.”
Ricki Saenz, the people operations manager at SA Youth, said it’s the students and the staff that make their program special.
“When you walk into this place and you meet with our employees, you just get the sense of love that they exude,” Saenz said.
Benavidez said funding is the biggest challenge on a regular basis for SA Youth.
SA Youth will hold its birthday bash at the Mexican Cultural Institute on Oct. 11 from 6-10 p.m. To read more about this event, click here.